


cataclysmic in your valour

by dekupages



Category: Adventure Time
Genre: Gen, I Say, Let This Boy Be Happy, as i write stories in which he is very deeply not happy, but ch4 is about Bear, doin Bear stuff, examinations of his past lives, its not graphic but still id rather overtag than undertag, like killing and eating small mammals, making up a couple extra while im at it, uuuuh im not gonna tag it for graphic violence cause its not, weird dream stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-12
Updated: 2019-01-25
Packaged: 2019-05-05 20:18:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 10,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14626284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dekupages/pseuds/dekupages
Summary: you were born to be a hero, and yet,





	1. Chapter 1

fate, as it turns out, has other plans.

he is born in fire and chaos, blue as the smallest waves of light as they scatter through layered fields of nitrogen and oxygen and water vapor and argon and carbon dioxide and a thousand other miscellaneous atoms. but he dies in blue, and words slide off him like water, burning up in his boiling atmosphere. he is born and he lives and he dies in wordless fire, and atoms and molecules mean nothing to him. his fragments sink into the primordial waters of a planet still oozing with the black heat of birth as a small satellite ripped from the ground begins new life in a gentle orbit around its mother. and the fragments sink, and at the bottom of the world, chains of atoms began to repeat.

does an atom have a soul? does a protein? does a mitochondria? does a cell? it is many eras before he sinks softly into stone, his ash-eating pieces decaying into preservation- a gift for knowledge-seekers lightyears ahead of this slow eon.

he is so cold. he is born under catalyst-white light, too soon to evolve the long, thick coat and fat stores he'll need to survive this all-consuming snow. too-thin limbs create better children than he in the cosmic seconds he has before he is overtaken.

he is a butterfly, briefly. he is many things briefly, too long and many to count, but this moment of blue wings and green grass and soft breezes sticks like a sunbeam full of dust pierced forever through a mind much older than the eyes that saw it. it is a very small link in his chain, but nonetheless it holds.

he is sugar and shades of pink. candy dances in his minds eye like wooden building blocks stacked into makeshift cities.

he is a girl with one arm and a best friend who walks on four legs. this seems familiar (but not too familiar).

he is a boy with one arm and a best friend who walks on four legs. pattern recognition is not his strong suit.

\--------

Finn keeps having weird dreams lately, and he doesn't like them. They're not bad, they're just... strange. Distasteful. They taste old and curdling on his tongue, sour and gross. It's better than waking up screaming, he guesses, but he isn't sure by how much. He doesn't remember them when he wakes up, just fading impressions like footprints in building snow.

\--------

he is new. every era, every lifetime, every year, every day, every hour, he is new. he is new when he is young and blue, new like nothing else can be, new as a fresh soul. new when his proteins replicate and copies of himself peal from his infinitesimal flesh. new when his white sibling bathes the world in ice and he must birth children gradually colder than him. new when cloth woven of chitin weaves him into graceful spirals along the curves of the winds. new when his cells decay back into primordialism and sugar fills his whole world. new when he is unwanted. new when he is wanted.

a being like him is change, and cannot be held down or held still. the world turns on, though his blue soul smears new through the forests and mountains and rivers and seas, building something new with every new breath.

\--------

Shoko was a criminal, someone who did something really bad even after Princess Bubblegum gave her all the good she could give. Was she a bad person? A good person in a bad situation? Maybe she was neither. Finn's grown a lot since all he did was swing his sword, but moral amboh... amba.. ambigooity- ambiguity! Moral ambiguity is a big concept and not one he really gets. Either a person has good intentions or bad intentions, right?

Talking with the princess helped a little, but it also gave him more questions. He's already picked Jake's brain as much as he dares (he does Not want to redo the vault thing, thank you). And Marceline... maybe isn't the best person to talk to about this.

...He doesn't know if he's a good person anymore. He used to think it wasn't even a question, but now... now he sees what he's done with older eyes, and it's not pretty. And maybe this on its own, he could get over, except he's seen who he's been before.

He isn't a hero. He's a survivor. In a choice between someone else and him, he's always chosen to live at another's expense, even when that cost was their death. Is that okay? Is living a sin, or is he in the right for killing someone?

Moral ambiguity sucks.

\--------

when he was blue, he died. he ripped flesh from the world and threw it into the sky, burned a hole into the ground a continent wide, plunged life into infant seas, tore the world asunder- but there was no choice, no thought, no intention. just a vessel and a path.

when he was simple, he ate. there was no choice, no thought, no intention. he just lived and birthed himself, over and over again, drinking in the dust of a young world. no brain or neurons could direct him. he just was.

when he was furred, he reproduced. his new world was harsh and terrible, but his many children would make it farther than he, to make their own children better than they. he and his children's sharp teeth and long claws tore apart every life in their path- watching them die one by one until whole species had no record but their frozen bones. his only intention was to live- is that thought? or is it just the way things are? is it choice? or is instinct no choice at all?

when he was winged, he flew. he drank the syrup of every shade of bloom. he had no choices at all, and he was happy. do you have free will, you powerless thing?

when he was pink, he existed. spoke strange and simple words. lived by things given and not made. too strange to be happy. too strange to be content. what intentions could he have?

when he was unwanted, he hurt. hurt others, hurt himself, hurt and hurt and hurt til a white tiger was the only thing in the world that loved him. but she sits still in the floorboards, a gentle smile on a long dead face. is living brave? is living moral? her thoughts had jagged edges and her intentions were carved of bone. what choices did she possibly have.

when he was wanted, he hurt. hurt others, hurt himself, hurt and hurt and hurt til he was the hero of a whole land, til love poured down on him from the heavens. his intentions are good. they must be. they must be. they must be. they must be. they must be. they must be. they must be. they must be. they must be. they m

\--------

Maybe he got cursed by a witch. Or a demon. Someone with magic and a bone to pick, the specifics are less important. He can't think of any other reason he would just... suddenly stop having real dreams. It's like he's blocked off, and with nowhere to go, his mind just echoes around itself til he's chasing old, old ghosts, pieces of himself so old he can't even imagine the scale. He was there for the beginning of life itself on this planet. That's just... too huge, too enormous, too vast, too... he's out of synonyms but it's just too big to fit in his skull. It's like trying to imagine the scale of the galaxy by seeing how far the earth is from the moon.

He doesn't feel that old. He just feels too small to not donk up everything, too small to know what the right choices are. Too small to know himself or the people he could be.

He's dreamt of Shoko enough to see the waters and hills of her world with his eyes open, and so he's dreamt of her companion. His companion. Jake. Of course it'd be Jake, they're brothers, best friends, closer than anything- of course he'd be with him when no one else was. Finn wonders if any of his other friends knew him in another life- if Princess Bubblegum was ever mortal, if Marceline was ever content, if Jake had other families, if if if.

He thinks of 'ifs' until he falls asleep again.

\--------

he was a blue cataclysm and life-giver. a green beginning and overtaker. a white conqueror and advancement. blue again to be gentle and powerless. pink and strange and taken care of. green again and hurting. blue one more time, and maybe this time a hero. but you've had so many chances- why would you be a hero now.

(because a creature like him is new with every era, every lifetime, every year, every day, every hour, every minute, every breath, every second.)


	2. Chapter 2

Finn has an old soul. A really old soul. A soul a couple cosmic seconds older than life on earth. One of the oldest souls out there.

Finn is sixteen years old and wondering what that means. For him, for the world, for his friends, for his purpose.

How can he be both? What's the point of living all those lives if he's so new every time, so different- why not just... be a different soul? He wonders what it means to be, to have a soul, to live.

Finn didn't use to think about things like this. He wishes he still didn't. But he keeps waking up with memories of a different him, and he can't seem to avoid it- it's just too big. Everywhere he looks, it stands, too big to hide away.

Princess Bubblegum's been having dreams lately. Dreams she says might be past lives. A president of a wide nation, charismatic leader of millions of people. A scientist, first to discover some type of radiation. Scientists, leaders, royalty- she's fixed, for the most part, orbiting around a set point that does not waver.

So why does he? Where is his fixed point? How can he define himself when he's been his own opposite over and over and over again? He's so old. Maybe so old that his fixed point broke, somewhere down the line, so much weight on it that it snapped, leaving Finn adrift in the water- the directionless end of a snapped chain.

\--------

a cataclysm becomes a single cell becomes a predator becomes an insect becomes a simple ooze becomes a lowly thief becomes a hero child. they don't, of course- links picked at random from a chain stretching out into an event horizon of iron and silver- but the concept is the same.

this time, he is a catalyst, and he is too young and bright to be anything else. before he is anything else, he is fire, and two two-dimensional planes intersecting see each other as simple lines of only one dimension. his mind was not created for this plane. not yet.

he has no thoughts to make sense of his brief existence. he doesn't need them. he won't for a few eons yet. neurons are eras upon eras from evolving on this brown and blue speck.

\--------

Marceline takes him to the highest point of a very old mountain. There is a giant there. The fight is vicious and freeing and all-consuming, and for just a little while, he feels complete, all his empty spaces brushed harshly aside to make room for the liquid fight running through his veins. It's long and brutal and lasts for hours, a deadly dance that turns stone to slag and green to black wherever it passes through. When the giant falls and doesn't get back up, Finn feels like he fits in his body for the first time in weeks. Panting heavy as he stands triumphant, he doesn't see the falling rock in time, and Marceline calls his name like a gunshot before he feels the sharp sting of her too-cold skin through the many tears in his shirt as she barrels him out of the way.

The rock lands with a small thunderclap. Bigger than two of him standing on top of one another, he would have been crushed like an ant.

Adrenaline is a drug like no other. Finn and Marcy's half-crazed laughter echoes down and down and down the tall mountain.

(Finn worries later. Is this all he is- a desire for a fight? Can he really be boiled down to adrenaline and a blade? He's a simple boy, who does simple things and has simple wants and makes simple choices. Is... is this his fixed point? Being simple? He's always felt a little dumb next to his friends, but with every simple dream, a once slow tide builds up higher and higher, til he can't see the top of the black wave.)

\--------

an ant is made of a thousand tiny parts, a trillion of them, uncountable complexity. he continues his path, not even one part. just a rock. just energy. a simple line, point a to point b, except point a isn't a place and point b is the beginning of time for a planet that will one day be very, very old. its rocks were there before, its gases and liquids, but a rock is just a rock.

he gave it life.

a line starts at one point and stops at another. he starts here and stops somewhere long into the nebulous future, and unbeknownst to him, his second dimension reaches up long and far. he doesn't have a name yet, but the word catalyst is etched deep and permanent into the invisible sheet of his being.

\--------

If he had been crushed by that rock, he probably wouldn't be a human the next time around. Would it be soon enough to meet Jake and Princess Bubblegum and Phoebe and Marceline all over again? Or would he wake up in a world empty of the people he loved, people who died without ever finding him again. Would it even matter if they did? What if he was so different he was unrecognizable? Would he be alone again?

If he has no fixed point, what's the point of having a soul? He feels... empty, just a vessel for memories that aren't his but feel like they are. Like his sense of self is being destroyed like a reflection in disturbed water. Like Finn Mertens is a reflection on a very, very deep pool, and he's being forgotten every hour as the sun shifts.

For a time, he was so simple he didn't even have thoughts. He's not even sure if a thing is alive at that point- not a living thing, no thoughts- so why does a comet have a soul? He can't say the first catalyst comet would be like him, even though they have the same soul, because even if the comet had a mind Finn could understand- if it had one at all- Finn's soul changes with every retry. The comet's soul changes with every retry.

Ugh- he doesn't like trying to think of his past lives as both him and not him. It just gives him a headache.

\--------

point a to point b. a simple thing.

point a (the beginning of the world) to point b (the end of it). a simple thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so it turns out i Love writing meta about Finn's past lives so im making a chapter for each one i mentioned. they will Not be in order. i will Try to come to a satisfying conclusion and not just a bunch of disparate angles on this kid, but no promises.
> 
> also side note: the only other fandom ive written for is Much more active, so those fics got W A Y more kudos and things, so its,,,, disappointing that this fics gotten such a small response. i appreciate every single one of you. i also appreciate them, dont get me wrong, im just tryin to show appreciation for the two (2) people who read this fic


	3. Chapter 3

a simple thing. a simple thing. a simple thing. a simple thing. a circular record writes itself again to write its skin again. no organelles to help it, it must blacken the skies of its new world itself, feasting on cosmic dust spat out at the bottom of the world, in its darkest places. it feasts on ancient molecules and it and its thousand copychildren are alone.

\--------

Finn thinks he should probably ask Peebs about this stuff. He knows she's not super thrilled about all this soul stuff- she doesn't know a whole lot about it yet, and for someone who knows as much as she does, that's scary to her- but he honestly doesn't know what his green dreams could possibly be about. He gets... impressions of repetition, of being small and sharp like there's just not enough stuff to make things all complicated and fuzzy at the edges like most things are. Impressions of a lifeless world, of being barely life himself. A lot of his lives don't have context, but this one makes the least sense of them all- well, of the ones he remembers right now.

Peebs asks a lot of questions. Gets really, really excited. Something about him possibly having been the earliest form of life on earth. He tells her as much as he can and sits quietly as she rambles herself into so many and so long words it makes his head spin, content to watch her be happy even if he understands about a word in 500, and that word is 'the'.

She wonders big things, about how a single cell can have a soul. If a thing powered by nothing but mechanical and chemical reactions is even capable of it. She clearly wants to believe Finn, but to be so very small...

Finn is the self-proclaimed king of avoidance. Princess Bubblegum shoves questions he was trying very hard not to find answers for in his face, and it makes him distinctly uncomfortable. He excuses himself and takes loud steps home to try and stomp out the noise growing bigger in his head.

\--------

an ant is stupid. a thousand red ants: each is still stupid.

a colony grows and sorts and wars and stocks and herds and breathes-

and yet an ant is stupid.

an amoeba is stupid. but there is no colony here- just him, again and again and again. is he stupid? or does he grow?

\--------

Finn is not... super smart. The opposite, some would say. Those people would definitely be jerks and dillweeds, but Finn wouldn't really disagree with them all that strongly. He knows he has a hard time with big concepts and words and complicated things. He knows he tends to swing first and ask questions later, even now after everything. He knows he has a hard time seeing grey in his black and white world, even though everyone around him lives in bright and complicated rainbows. But that doesn't mean... it doesn't mean he can be boiled down to- to nothing, does it? He's not very smart, but he's still a person. He makes choices and has thoughts and stuff- just cause an amoeba doesn't and he was an amoeba once doesn't mean he's... simple like that.

Except he makes bad choices. Has stupid thoughts. Doesn't fully understand situations and charges in sword swinging because it's easier than trying to put everything together when sometimes it feels like the world and all its sounds and sights and smells and feelings and people are just too big to cram into his skull.

Finn feels stupid. He feels like maybe some part of him has just always been stupid. Like he's got a stupid soul, so small and simple it could fit in an amoeba.

...He's not sure who to turn to. If he even should. If maybe talking to someone about this will just force them to tell him empty platitudes and make them feel guilty about lying to him.

Finn does what he does best- he turns away from thoughts that hurt or scare him. He drowns them out with the satisfying 'sching' of sharp metal through air, the burn of his muscles as he drains them again and again, pouring out his strength through the edge of his sword. And he lies in his bed and lets the pounding of his heart echo through his ribs until it rocks him to sleep.

\--------

a beast is more alive than its cells are more alive than its atoms. is a pack more alive than its beasts?

green and stardust filters through the seabed. he is more alive than a comet and less alive than anything he'll ever be after this. linear, in this case, means progressive- not always forwards, but a line cannot repeat itself or hold still. so he eats more stardust and makes more green. and unbeknownst to him, he waits to be more alive.

a useless child breathes heatless fire and wastes and waits. its mother builds empires while she waits for it to stand. life is a strange and dividing adjective, though its edges blur infinitely beneath amplified glass.

a comet grows like a child. not always, but this one does.

\--------

Finn hates his dreams. Hates the way he wakes up feeling small and strange, skin prickling like it's borrowed and new. Hates the way it leaves him with a bitter smear on his mind that sticks and stinks all day, open like a sore. Hates the way he feels scared to sleep, afraid he'll wake up with the memories of a monster or a murderer.

His dreams haunt him in his waking hours, and they're too big and vague to contain and lock away, and that scares him too. He's used to bad experiences- there are a thousand smoothed over holes in his memories he refuses to examine for fear of what he'll find inside- but this feels like a taint on his soul, an infection crawling through more and more of his mind with every second he spends asleep.

Maybe he just won't sleep at all anymore. Maybe if he drags this out long enough, wrings himself of every last drop of energy before he passes out, he won't have the energy to dream.

Worth a shot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> did you know the first life on earth probably had circular chromosomes and produced methane and ate minerals from hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor? wild.
> 
> also: i do headcanon finn as being at least a little... slow. im not personally, but my sister will essentially have the mental capacity of a nine-year-old for the rest of her life, so this is important to me. not being neurotypical- even in ways that are just objectively detrimental- doesn't mean someone isnt a person or deserves less than the people around them. humans build communities and societies to protect our weakest links, because theyre still valuable, still valued. i dont mean to get preachy or try to defeat ableism with an adventure time fanfiction, but i just think people like my sister deserve better from a society that, at large, would really rather turn a blind eye to her, and that starts with normalization.  
> (side note: the non-dream parts are from Finn's perspective, so im not calling him stupid, hes calling himself stupid. hes still just a teenager, and self-depreciation is what teenagers do best after all.)
> 
> andddd back on a lighter note: do yall wanna see my notes? theyre Very short but they do spoil the themes for each chapter
> 
> also emergence is the coolest fucking thing. like, how do ant colonies do that? wild. i did directly take inspiration from this chapter from this video about emergence https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16W7c0mb-rE


	4. Chapter 4

this time she should be brown, as all bears are, but she is born under a comet whose sub-zero fire burns her fur white. she is born a colorless mutation, but her sick skin blends perfectly with the new world.

she is so cold. she is so hungry.

\--------

Finn could never be a vegetarian. Meatloaf is just... so good. He doesn't even really see the point of it- plenty of plants are sentient too, so you're still maybe killing something. Anyway, a lot of things die or need to die- isn't it more wasteful to let them rot than it is moral?

Finn's never really gone hungry- Joshua was more than well off and by the time their portion had run out, Finn and Jake had built their own small fortune. But he has had to make do, stuck out in the wilds or a dungeon or a thousand other places an unfortunate adventurer could find themselves trapped. He's hunted or scavenged plenty.

So why does this feel... different?

He dreams of being a bear- or at least something that would eventually be a bear- and thoughts of hunting settle uneasily in his guts. He's never had a problem with it before, but scenes of red splayed out on white snow drip like a stain over his brain. He doesn't get it- he was hungry, literally starving all the time, desperately and constantly searching for the next scrap, his actions were arguably more justifiable than any hunt he's ever had in this life- but it won't scrub out, and he keeps waking up from blood-soaked nightmares of bones and flesh tearing under his huge claws and sharp teeth.

He kills monsters, because hurt caused to one is small next to all the things it would've hurt if left alive. He's killed scavengers when he was a scavenger too, because.... because.

Because.

\--------

she pants and struggles and heaves as one and the next break free of her. there is no higher thought on this bleached planet- no sticks nor stones to spark and cast light on infant sentience. this world produces to reproduce. this world is young and cancerous, and she plays her part in the dark of a hollowness bored out of the white earth. they are naked and blind and she loves them with all the life she has left. for the third time, she pants and heaves and hurts in the snow as her young drink her up. 

she gets up to find more life to steal.

there is a rabbit. she screams and squeals as she breaks. her children are quieter, but they are less filling.

\--------

Some of his dreams feel more... him then others. Sometimes it feels like he's experiencing them as they were, and sometimes its more like he's just looking on from behind someone else's eyes.

Sometimes he feels like the bear. But the dreams about her cubs feel like something only for her. Like she's still in him, somewhere, and she's standing snarling over her cubs still, daring him to think them anyone's but hers. He wonders if any of his other lives had kids.

\--------

her first cubs died cold, the way she will one day. the barren world had no fuel to offer, and their fires died without a whimper. she lived beyond them, and made more in their image. does a beast grieve? the world keeps getting whiter.

she tears apart young things. she tears apart old things. her weak eyes see mist as the right things bound away. not yet alive, and outlived- those are what feed the children who make it long enough to feel meat and bones beneath them. white is a curse and a blessing all at once. an animal sees itself before its legacy, but her legacy will breed out her pale eyes and burn her into the snow and ice of some far off millennia.

\--------

If there weren't any predators, wouldn't the world be better? There wouldn't be killing or murder or complicated questions about creatures that need to kill to live. Everything could live together in peace. It'd be great, right? Nice and simple.

\--------

she loves her children. she loves them like she loves nothing else, with a fire she doesn't have hands to hold. this world is brutal but it's hers, just like her children are yet weak but still hers. empty skies and hissing winds curl around her soul, in this moment, paint harsh yet vibrant lines across it in shades of ice and grey. they can't be ignored, can't be washed off. she is a fighter, a survivor, and she earned her place in this world, fought for it with every inch of her- because it was worth fighting for. old wounds drag pink paths across the shape of her, but she would not give a single one.

\--------

Finn talked to Marcy, to Princess Bubblegum, to Jake, even to BMO. And the thing is- predators are as much a part of this world as plant-eaters. If everyone ate plants, there would be no more plants left to eat. And if everyone ate plant-eaters, there'd be no more plant-eaters left to eat. And if everyone were plants, there would be no more nutrients in the dirt to eat. There's a balance to things he's never even noticed. It's beautiful, really, in the perfect way everything balances like a plate on a needlepoint.

But it's ugly, still, in the way death folds into every crevice of it.

(But beautiful again in the love born into every living thing, in the way life burns like a blazing fire that will never go out.)

\--------

she is not cruel. she is not kind. she is a beast, and she lives to live. she has no hands to make cities with, no voice to sing hymns to the universe, no eyes to see into the distant star-flung future and revel in peoples from a universe of strangeness and life and love- but she lives. that is enough for her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> nothin much to say this time. sorry it took so long but not that sorry cause i still finished it. did you know the ancestors of bears looked a lot like bears? seems like they figured out their thing and stuck with it.


	5. Chapter 5

what use is a ghost?

he flutters like cloth woven of the thinnest strands of cotton, no thicker than a hair, no thicker than a breath. superfluous rainbows paint his whole world in many-hued beauty, and his six hologram legs bend nothing as he stops to drink. the small puddle is too muddy to even look back at him, and his dewdrop throat too small to touch it. he leaves without a sound, too feather-light for even the wind to notice him.

unseen. unfelt. unheard.

\--------

Everywhere he goes, someone looks. Civilians with looks of relief or joy or- more often then he'd like, but far less often then they used to- confusion or fear. Monsters who bellow with challenge or tremble with cowardice. His friends. His almost-not-quite-sorta-but-not-really-friends. (Well, friend. No one was Ice King but Simon, and no one was Simon but Ice King.)

Everywhere he steps, he leaves footprints. Towns saved, towns doomed. Families reunited, monsters torn apart. Problems solved, problems created.

He wonders sometimes what it'd be like to be a ghost. He was Davey, for a short while, and that was fun. Quiet, simple. He could breath, and for once no one was watching his ribs expand and collapse. He could be out of rhythm if he wanted to, out of sync with everybody else, and it wouldn't matter. And because it didn't, he no longer was. No pressure, no weight on his shoulders, and he took a deep breath, and then another, and he kept going, because there was nobody there to stop him. He made friends, because he was no one's god. He got a job, and the simple motions soothed him.

Being Davey was great. He missed it sometimes.

\--------

'world' is a big word. he knows many big words, like pond and field and branch, and smaller words like grass and dew, but world is a word too big for a butterfly. shards of light dance on the quicksand surface of the pond, tempting and dangerous, and he drifts away on a breath of air that catches his wings and nudges him gently but surely along.

he eats. he flutters. he drifts. something huge, something bigger than his whole mind's eye tries to wrap its stench and fear and flesh around him, cup him in, but he dances away under the watchful eye of that eternal child.

only the child sees him- everything else keeps moving. so he dances, just to hold this single sliver of acknowledgement. he dances, and dances, and dances, until one day-

he is too high. there is too much white, too much light.

\--------

A moth drifts past him as he sits. The leaves of the treehouse are rough beneath him, cool and coarse under his fingertips. The moth's white wings flutter like a video with dropped frames as it stutters onwards in bits and pieces, ever one beat closer to its destination. The pale moon stains it blue, but it doesn't seem to care.

Finn lifts his hand. The moon has stained him too, and he rolls the delicate hue carefully between his fingers, watching shadows weave smoothly between his digits just to catch on the occasional twitch.

It's quiet here. It's a different quiet than a bustling kingdom that doesn't see you, or a world so small a single tree eclipses it, but it's a quiet all the same. He thinks maybe he should be bored here, that it should be too quiet, but he is more than entertained by the moonlight pouring over and dripping through his hands. If he moved too fast, breathed too loudly, he'd break it, so unlike the helpless quiet of a butterfly. He treasures it for that a little- it's his choice to be quiet this time.

But he was so happy to be quiet when he was Davey, so why does a butterfly's quiet make him feel... helpless?

\--------

he dies in the mouth of a snake, a writhing thing who swallows him whole as his wings rip and tear and his body turns to sludge, metamorphosis in reverse.

\--------

The cave shakes and screams ominously, dreadfully, dust and grey pieces beginning to choke the air as stone begins to crack, too damaged by the battle within to hold itself up any longer. The cave's walls are crumbling around him, and unfinished fight or not, Finn needs to leave NOW. He turns on his heel and flees, and runs faster when an enraged bellow starts chasing him and iron hooves echo like gunshots with every impact on the stone floor.

Busted walls and sharp-toothed ravines and collapsed ceilings tangle his strings in the maze, and even as he struggles to heave himself through too small openings, his pursuer is barely slowed as it plows through solid rock. Each step it takes sends the walls shaking, breaks one more support, gets the mountain that much closer to just giving in and caving in on itself and the beast just plain closer.

He is out of time and out of luck.

He's not sure he's stopped screaming once since he turned tail and ran, but he calls names now- Jake, Princess, Marceline, anyone-

He slips and the last thing he knows as his head splits open and red iron pours out is relief and the color pink.

\--------

what more is there to say about a butterfly.

\--------

He called, and someone answered, and despite the quiet life of Davey Johnson, Finn thinks he understands what was so terrifying about a butterfly's quiet.

He spends some days more in a bed in the Candy Kingdom, head wrapped in and stuffed with cotton. He's on pain medication for the first few days- his skull had fractured. It wasn't a big wound, wasn't nearly as serious as it could have been, but it still scared everyone. He drifts in and out of lucidity, and grins dopily at the hands that smooth out his wings and skin the snake. He is fine with being loud. It is more than worth it to be heard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i dont have anything to say this time but it feels weird not having an end note. uhhhh how are yall? excited for the end? i know i am. its sad to see it go but id rather it end well now than piss itself in a couple years and get remembered poorly. still, im pumped for the finale, i bet its gonna be so cool!!
> 
> EDIT:  
> http://madgoats.tumblr.com/post/176510651140/he-thinks-maybe-he-should-be-bored-here-that-it  
> AAAAAAAAAAAAH CHECK OUT THIS REALLY GOOD FANART AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH


	6. Chapter 6

in this world, he is

pink

bubbling stillness seeps through his every crevice and he rots slowly slowly slowly slowly-

\--------

Things calm down for a little bit after he hurts his head. After a few days spent drifting lazily and loopily in and out of consciousness and lucidity, he was finally taken off the pain meds and told to go home and rest.

He goes home and rests.

His head throbs sharply if he turns too fast and he gets dizzy if he moves around too much, and the white around his head is still gauze instead of his hat, and so despite how restless he feels as flashing colors gently strobe on BMO's face and his clumsy thumbs skip and drag across the controller, he stays sprawled across the couch.

Jake makes meatloaf for dinner. It's delicious as always, yet it's... heavy. Settles uneasily in his stomach. It's uncomfortable in a way that makes him shift uneasily within his sleeping bag, makes it hard to fall asleep.

He does eventually of course.

\--------

sugar gum sticky candy sweet syrup sweet sweet,

pink white purple pink neon neon pink pastel pink sweet pink,

oozing sticky slow-drip chemical sweet,

made created complex-simple sweet.

\--------

Princess Bubblegum gave them some simple instructions- don't stay in one position too long or you'll get bedsores, but try to stay lying down or at least sitting as long as you can. Absolutely NO fighting, try not to play BMO too much or you'll get a wicked headache. Don't leave the house unless it's an emergency, and even then, use your phone before your fists. You're vulnerable as all get out until your concussion wears off. And Jake, DON'T LET HIM LEAVE. I know you're like a cool older brother type, but seriously, don't go hunt down whoever built that big gnarly robot until Doctor Princess gives you the go ahead. I cannot stress enough how bad news bears a concussion can get if you don't take care of it properly. Really I shouldn't even be letting you read or play video games or do thinking stuff at all, but frankly I don't trust you not to do something stupid without anything to do. All right boys, you're free to go. Call me every other day so I know how his recovery is going okay? I don't want his concussion getting worse while my back is turned. All right, see you guys later, get better soon! And don't forget to eat a hea- you know what, I'm just gonna have Pep But send you a list. All right, for realsies this time, see you guys.

...What was he thinking about again?

He rolls over. Best not to stay in one position to long or he'll get bedsores.

\--------

fed white. given pink. fed white. given pink. fed white. given pink. fed white. given pink.

needs white. likes pink. given white, given pink. bubble pop gurgle ooze, doesn't quite move but sometimes almost tilts. gurgle.

\--------

Ugh, he hates this!! He hates sitting here and laying here and not doing anything to help! Jake got called away, Ice King's apparently found some new scheme he thinks will win over Peebs, and Finn just has to sit here and it sucks!! It sucks it sucks it SUCKS because Jake's gonna come home worn out and ready to sleep but he won't, he'll cook Finn's dinner instead, because Finn still gets dizzy standing too long even though it's been a whole week since he woke up! He hates this, hates more than anything feeling like a- a burden! Like dead weight! Like-

"Finn? Are you okay?" BMO's warbly little voice jerks him out of his train of thought, and he wakes up to find tear tracks drying sticky on his face. When did that happen?

"I'm- I'm fine BMO, it's okay, you can go back to playing. It's nothing."

BMO doesn't look like they believe him at all, but then they shrug and taptaptap back down the ladder, and it doesn't matter anymore.

\--------

fed white. given pink.

you know how this story goes. why are you still here? fed white, given pink, and then it dies. what could you possibly gain from this?

\--------

He doesn't know why he feels so bad but he hates it! Hates it hates it hates it HATES IT!! He should be fine and okay and getting better except all he wants to do is chew his own leg off like a bear in a trap!

He hates that without anything to do, all he does is sleep, and all he dreams about is a pink so sweet it turns sick, and he always wakes up feeling... some way he doesn't know how to describe, like if you spread guilt like jam until it's too thin to identify but everywhere and inescapable. A guilt like instead of an action, he's just guilty for being. It feels like _him_  too- not a carry-over from some dead thing, but like here and now there's something to feel guilty about except there's _not_  and he just hates the way he's stuck feeling bad about nothing at all, just spinning his wheels without going anywhere but deeper into the mud.

He needs to get out soon or he's gonna lose his mind.

\--------

white. pink.

gentle hands slide carefully under it,

and he doesn't know why.

\--------

He gets better, and within the hour of Doctor Princess's approval, his blade is cutting frantic swaths through hordes of creeping twisted metal, jagged edges carved off of that great beast and now taped together into mismatched spider-like junklets.

No more guilt. He carries his weight and something else's because he doesn't know what else to do, doesn't know how else to justify his own useless and long dead existence.

He feels... sickly sweet, and he burns off the saccharine stench with the steam bellowing from the sides of a pair of great iron behemoths.

He and Jake go home hours later, far more beat up than just a fractured skull, but victorious, and Finn feels finally absolved- at least for now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey guys! betchu didnt expect to see me so soon, huh? i've been on a MAJOR adventure time kick lately, and ive already read all the fic i can find thats decent quality , and i needed more content so im Making it. be the change you want to see in the world. anyway i cant WAIT until i have the money for pirates of the enchiridion!! real chap notes tho:
> 
> 1) i chose pronouns Very deliberately  
> 2) im not talkin to you. when i use You i am directly talking to finn ie its something Finn himself is thinking, if not directly then in more vague terms and concepts. normally i like to play around with talking directly to the audience, and honestly i still am, i just want to clarify that just cause im using You does Not mean its not part of Finns thought process. So i gues really i Am talking to You, im just also talking to finn, and also I am finn. god i love writing, nobody can tell me what to do


	7. Chapter 7

i guess wishing for a second chance is useless. i got one.

i still wish i spent my first one better.

....i think i could have loved her. isn't that a strange thought? you wanted so desperately to be loved by her, and i wanted so desperately to love her.

i guess that's what happens when you're immortal though. you get to meet people over and over again, one way or another.

\--------

Finn.... doesn't know how to feel about his most recent dreams. What do you call an invasion, except you're doing the invading? It's painfully, wrenchingly familiar, like a smell or a taste more familiar than your own voice, yet you can't quite remember where you know it from. It's like your reflection moving a second out of sync, except he's seen his own face like that and that only felt strange and uncomfortable, not....

His other lives were simple, animals and constructs and atoms. But Shoko was a person, a real thinking person, who talked and smiled and learned and grew and everything and- Shoko is recent too, maybe only a step or two away from his own pale, human skin.

Shoko isn't a phantom like the others, is the point, and that thought scares him too, because that means one day he and Shoko will be. He's so terrified of that thought, of being- not even a memory anymore. He's sad, too, for all the lives he's lived that left nothing but frayed edges where something whole once was.

What even is he?

\--------

she dreams of a mother, in her last day. a mother with green skin and dull eyes and hands that held her down as she screamed and screamed and didn't stop screaming, and a mom with pink skin and metal to fill the gaps left by meat and bone, who wanted nothing more from her than her own happiness. it's a fleeting sleep, barely more than a half-hour's doze, but there was something about it that left her clinging to the remnants in her last moments.

a mom. she thinks she would like to have a mom one day.

\--------

Finn doesn't often like to think about the way he used to feel about Princess Bubblegum. It was... bad. Just- bad to think about, sticky shame and guilt clinging to him like the world's worst syrup, and bad in general- he had a piece of her hair for goodness sakes! Eugh, just- bad bad bad bad. He hates the way he can't change what happened, can't fix his past self. He wishes... he wishes he were better, back then, could see things the way he sees them now.

Bubblegum is old. Like- really, really old. Way, way too old for a stupid little kid. And more importantly- not interested, which she made clear many, many times.

He hates hates HATES that he can't undo his whole creepy... thing.

She's one of his best friends. He guesses that probably means something important about like, forgiveness and growth and junk, except Finn's not really sure he's one of her best friends. He knows she's busy, knows that even Marceline feels brushed off by her sometimes, but it's just-

If he were her, he'd probably have gotten tired of him a long time ago.

\--------

bubblegum isn't that old. or, it doesn't seem like it at least. she barely looks older than herself! it would be weird to feel... it'd be weird to want her as a mom. and maybe she was- she was really vibin' parentally and puttin' out mega protective jubies, but that could've just been her own messed up brainpan interpreting it wrong.

she hates that she can't just steal the amulet and get back to her life, except... she remembers what the boss told her. 'i'll let you join my gang' isn't an offer. there's a deep, deep pit of trepidation inside of her, thinking about the life she would find outside these saccharine walls. but she would rather have an unhappy life than none at all- that's nothing new.

...the princess likes her. it's obvious to her, because why else would she make her a whole new dang arm. but she is more afraid than she could ever be faithful, and for that she's sorry.

it's not the princess's fault that she's like this.

\--------

He wants to be- kinder. Slower to swing. Faster to forgive. He wants to be good, the way his friends pull off effortlessly.

....That's not true and he knows it, but he would really much rather think about his own faults than Bonnie's. 

(It always comes back to her in the end.)

\--------

she doesn't know exactly how old she is, but she knows she's shorter than most of the grown-ups she's met. still growing. a child, she supposes, but calling herself something to be taken care of after so long with only white and black fur and one green fist to protect her seems.... wrong, somehow. she might not be the tallest or oldest she'll ever be, but she's no kid.

so why does the princess make her feel so young and small?

it should feel.... bad, right? when the bath boys tower over her, leering and cruel, she feels small then and she hates it. but the princess stands there, tall and regal and pinker than anything she's ever seen, and speaks every bit as sweet as she smells and she feels-

she feels-

\--------

What is he? He can't stop thinking about it. He keeps thinking in circles and loops and figure-eights that lean and twist and snare trying to catch some stray thread he can follow to its source, but its sides are smooth as glass and cold as ice beneath his mental fingers. He is Finn Mertens, and he remembers his life, and he has only ever had this body and watched it grow- but she was Shoko, just Shoko, and she remembers that life too. Two sides of the same coin except the coin has so many sides Finn's not sure any single one is more true than another. The impossible coin sits in his brain and he can't think around it or really grasp it and it's all he can do to not just- to not just-

To not just what?! He doesn't even know! All he knows is that his brain feels full to bursting and Shoko is him but not and therefore Finn Mertens is him but not but he IS, HE IS FINN MERTENS-

\--------

i'm sorry. i think we might just be too old. or maybe not old enough? i don't know, im just a dead girl.

either way, i'm sorry all you get from me are dreams of dreams. but maybe not that sorry, cause there's been a lot of suck in our various lives, and i got a whole helping of it my turn around, and you don't need any more of that then you got.

but i'm sorry i couldn't help you.

(i'm sorry i couldn't help me.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BMO I LOOOOOOOOOOOOVE YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
> 
> i cried during their song and i am Not ashamed to admit it. god i loved the finale it was so,,,,,FUNCING GOOD i havent stopped yelling since i saw it. the animation was so good too, like, there were a bunch of little moments i really liked and the golbetty transformation was just about the sickest thing i ever saw, and the whole thing was just,,,,,,god. god. god. god. im gonna watch it again, GOD
> 
> im totally gonna write a thing about the various nightmares you get from almost getting digested by golb tho >:3c


	8. Chapter 8

Finn doesn't know what she sees in him. Or rather, he knows a lot of things she sees in him, and doesn't know what gets overlapped, tucked away beneath something she's deemed more important. He doesn't know what conclusions she's come to, what lines she's drawn in red between snapshots of memories. He doesn't really know anything about her at all. He sees- pink, and beautiful, and wonderful smelling, and smarter than anybody, and brave, and kind and diligent and funny and- and sometimes cruel without meaning, cruel without thinking, cruel like a magnifying glass to an ant but she was just trying to get a better look... he can't blame her for any of it. Not really. Because he sees all that, but he doesn't have the slightest clue what she thinks. What she thinks about him. She loves Marcy, and she likes Jake, and she doesn't see Lady all that often anymore but they're still close and meet for tea every other wednesday, and she at the very least tolerates Finn, and... and he doesn't know what any of it means. She loves science first, she loves her duty first, she loves the life she's built for herself first. She's older than Finn can fathom living, despite dreams of memories of ghosts, and smarter than Finn can imagine being, and maybe he'll never ever understand her.

Maybe that's okay?

She works towards good, despite everything. She works to grow and do better, despite everything. She keeps him close, despite everything. She moves forward, despite everything.

Maybe that's okay.

\--------

he sees- blue fire, and the eternal black silk pierced by white hot needles, and a yellow eye casting his infinite shadow, and a bronze crown encrusted in sapphires, and the end of the world. he can't blame him for... any of it. not even the arc of his ionized tail or the scattering of his dust. and he knows. he sees the waters part and sees a single vast teardrop as it curdles in his last instance. and he knows. he sees a single mote of dust that the earth must cry for and he knows.

and maybe that's okay.

\--------

It is a bright day, and Jake spends it in the grassy hills, half-sunk into the rolling green tides of gentle blades. He brings a couple sandwiches. He comes back inside once the sun sets, and he tells Finn all about the great day he had.

It is a white day, and Jake curls up in the pocket of Finn's shirt to hide from the dome of mist that cups the treehouse. He comes out once to play a brief and poorly thought out game of The Floor Is Lava using the marshmellows in a pleasantly steaming mug of cocoa, and ends up sulking back in Finn's pocket, nursing his burnt feet and complaining in a voice far too small to hear. He does not need to tell Finn about his day, as he was there for most of it, but he tries anyway- he wants to tell Finn how great his day was, and how many great movies they watched, and how nice it was to have the whole treehouse hanging out together.

It is a black day, thick storm clouds wreathing Ooo in impenetrable darkness and unceasing blades and great booming strikes of lightning, and Jake stands at the window and watches. He watches, and he plays with BMO, and he flips over the couch to make a mini fort with Finn, and he helps NEPTR pie Finn the moment he steps out of that fort, and he watches. And later, tucked into bed, his last words before sleep takes him are... he had a great day.

Jake has good days. Jake makes good days. He likes to complain for the sake of complaining, and he likes to throw himself headfirst into bad decisions he'll later regret (Finn heavily relates), and he sometimes gets frustrated by the smallest things and builds monuments out of molehills. But he also likes to watch the knives fall, and feel the grass against his fur, and enjoys spending time with his family.

He doesn't work towards anything, doesn't move in any particular direction. He drifts like a leaf on the breeze, and he revels in the wind that carries him.

\--------

it is the same night it has always been, and he spends it well. he consumes ash in the dark heart, preys on the walls of the earth's great heaving lungs. he is as close to content as a thing like him can be.

it is the same night it has always been, and he spends it well. he sets to pulling himself apart at the seams, ripping himself in two identical pieces. he sews a second soul in preparation, and he is as close to content as a thing like him can be.

it is the same night it has always been, and he spends it well. he ties himselves shut, and drifts away to seek the pulsing dusts of another world- one not so crowded. the currents sing to him as they push him so gently along the floor. he is as close to content as a thing like him can be.

it is the same night it has always been,

\--------

Marceline sings.

Alone, in front of a crowd, at the top of her lungs, in a tearful whisper, flying solo, by somebody's side- Marcy sings like she does nothing else, with a joy Finn doesn't think anything else brings her.

He sees, shaped by the flickering firelight behind her, the shadows of her past she casts on the wall. Heartbreak and pain and loss, for centuries. Fear and loneliness and hurt, for centuries.

Her unlife has hurt her, over and over and over again. But she's still here. Still singing.

Finn wishes he could wrap up all her hurt and hide it away like he hides his own, let her be carefree and happy and relieve her of the weight of her endless existence for just a day- but he can't, and doesn't think she would want that even if he could offer it. It amazes him, a little bit, inspires him a little bit.

She can be mean or strange or harsh or rude, but she let Bonnie do something really scary to her for a chance to grow up, even though that meant she would be as mortal as everyone else. For a chance to move on and do better.

She has two small scars she earned twice over, and she still sings.

\--------

The bear lives.

Red paints this world, forever, beyond the scope of a bear, beyond the scope of a single shining tiny soul. It's a red world, regardless of blue and green and white.

She is a red beast, regardless of white and black and white.

Hurt doesn't matter. Hunger doesn't matter. Her world is hurt, her world is hunger. Loss doesn't matter. Her world is loss.

Survival couldn't possibly be too heavy a burden to bear- what else is there? She might as well give up and let the air crush her.

She has scars and scars and scars and she has killed and killed and killed, and she still lives.

\--------

Little feet patpatpat down the ladder as BMO shouts excitedly to greet them. Finn is tired and sore and hungry and BMO can't change any of that, can't magically heal the big red scratch Jake is cradling against his chest, but Finn smiles nonetheless as they bounce bounce bounce and smile smile smile. Finn spent the entire trudge home wishing desperately they were there already so he could collapse into bed, but now that he's here and BMO is begging to know what happened, what else can Finn do but lower himself in steps onto the couch and pat his lap. BMO skitters up with giggles spilling out in their familiar robotic tone, and for all it means there's even more time before he can sleep, their wide-eyed excitement lights up something content and soothing in his chest. He begins to speak.

He wakes to a sobbing BMO in his arms, little plastic fists thump thump thumping into his ribs. They gasp and heave and wail even as his arms wrap around them weakly and he groggily tries to sooth, to question, with a tongue made out of cotton. Jake is sitting next to him, fur rubbing up against his bare arm, but despite the noise he hasn't stirred. BMO eventually chokes out something about a monster- a wizard- a /something/ that came into their house and cast a spell- poisoned them- did /something/ that put them too sleep. NEPTR wouldn't wake up, and Finn and Jake wouldn't wake up, and the phone wouldn't work, and BMO hid and hid and was so so so scared- and couldn't do anything at all to help, to fight. They tried so hard but they just got kicked down the steps and hurt like NEPTR was-

Finn can't tell what's true and what isn't, how the story ended, why he and Jake have weird glowing red bracelets on and where NEPTR is- but he knows he has to comfort BMO first. They've been through a lot, even if they're exaggerating it won't make them less distressed right now. He rocks back and forth as BMO's sobs trail to whimpers in his arms. He will soon stand up, collect his thoughts, investigate the treehouse and the bracelets and NEPTR and probably go hurtling out into some villains lair to thrash them. He comforts BMO first, even though it doesn't get him a single step closer to figuring anything out.

\--------

bright wings flapflapflap though the blue blue sky, and he flaps some more.

what does a butterfly know? what does a butterfly do?

the sky is blue. he cannot change this, but it doesn't make it less wonderful. the leaf is stable beneath his hairsbreadth legs, but it is still pleasantly cool and smooth. the flower is a brilliant shining red, and its sweet nectar is wonderful to him, and nothing he could do would change either of these things.

soon he will die, and he could never do anything to change that.

\--------

The Ice King- Simon- Ice Simon?... Ice King is sitting in Marceline's living room, voice croaking and harsh and bad to hear as he screech-sings something about... penguin mustard? His matted beard has visible fleas. Marceline smiles softly at him with sad, sad eyes and laughs loudly as she makes up a harmony part on the fly, a fast rhythm coming alive to pulse beneath the IK's disjointed ditty. Finn sways back and forth to the beat he's playing with his hands on Gunter's soft little tummy while the penguin in question wenks along with Ice King.

Voices and ax-bass and wenking and tummy-drum make a strange sound all entwined, a little senseless and pitchless and strange, but... it's fun. Finn's having fun, and so are Ice King and Marceline and Gunter.

It's worth it to be here, even if he does get fleas, if nothing else than because it makes Ice King happy.

Ice King likes to make music with his friends. So his friends make music with him. He can be- is usually- strange and hard to handle and confusing and intense, but he's also lonely and longing and deserves better than long lonely days and long lonely nights.

Ice King can be strange, but he likes making music with his friends.

\--------

pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink! pink!

white! white! white! white! white! white! white! white!

pastel neon primary secondary tertiary pale dark neutral- 

pink. white.

................pink, white!

\--------

Finn did something bad to Pheobe, a long time ago. (It wasn't that long ago). A few bad things, really. Some embarrassing things too, though honestly those are less important. (But they were very, very embarrassing).

Pheobe has had too many people do bad things to her. It's only logical that she's done some bad things herself.

They used to get along like- well. Like a house on fire, he supposes. He did something stupid and he put the fire out, and they've kindled it again (with fewer expectations this time), and Pheobe is so... phenomenal to him he feels a little bit unworthy of that forgiveness.

But the thing is...

He doesn't really think Pheobe forgives him. Maybe she's just decided to move on, to let him prove he's better with his actions instead of his words.

Maybe that's just wishful thinking.

...Does that apply to her too?

She's been scared, and angry, and terrible before, had greater power to destroy than Finn ever could even in his darkest moments. She wasn't always so willing to cool off. She's better now, just like he's better now, but they were still...

They were still those people once. That hasn't changed. They don't have different brains, different souls from the people they were before, when they were hurt and hurt others in turn. Hurt each other.

Finn tries very, very hard to be a person worthy of Pheobe's friendship despite all he's done. Pheobe works to be the person her kingdom needs despite all she's done.

He's glad they have that chance.

\--------

She holds, for just an instant, something precious.

She knows what value is, knows the weight of sparkle and shine, knows the importance of food and clean water and shelter, knows what things are worth how much to who. She always thought precious was just something you could sell for a lot- gold and gems and junk. Precious was something you guarded, something you'd hurt others to get back, something you'd fight to hold onto.

She really does regret not holding onto to it.

She hurt someone very badly to be rid of it instead, and then she died alone, and that was it. What an unsatisfying story, huh Finn?

\--------

Maybe if he looked hard enough and dug deep enough, one day he could pull a bear's bones from the earth and trace every notch in them as he remembered how he got them. Maybe if he looked through enough of Bonnie's logs, he could find footage a failed experiment wrapped in pink and white, burbling softly to an empty room. Maybe he could bury Shoko, and she'd tell him her story as the dirt poured over her.

But would it change anything?

His name is Finn Mertens. Whatever else he is can wait. He has friends in the here and now and a life to live regardless of his own ghosts. Today, he is meeting with Pheobe and Marceline to go to a contest they've both entered, and he'll cheer them on with all the air he can fit in his lungs, and Bonnie will arrive just in time to see her girlfriend sing. Tomorrow, he's visiting Ice King in his castle for a 'surprise' that's almost certainly a scrapbook of them hanging out, if his constantly giggly 'hinting' about them looking "good enough to take pictures of" is anything to go by. Jake and BMO will want to see it when he gets back, but only for a moment because BMO will be too excited about the movie night they've been planning for a week.

Finn is tired of being a stranger to himself. He is very lucky to not be a stranger to his friends. He thinks as long as that stays true, it doesn't really matter whatever he was before Finn Mertens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am,,,, so happy to have finished this. its my first complete multi-chap fic!!!! sorry this took so long, i kind of lost interest in adventure time, but i really wanted to finish this! im honestly not sure how i feel about it as a whole, but my writing can only get better if i practice so- even if its not the best, it was still valuable to me! and if you guys like it too, than thats a pretty great side effect. thanks for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> hey my names danny im 18 and i never fuckin learned how to write
> 
> my writing tumblr is https://dekupages.tumblr.com/ if yall wanna come talk to me


End file.
